


The Five Stages of Grief

by katsbishops



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Young Avengers (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Past Rape/Non-con, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape Recovery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-12-26 10:11:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12056799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katsbishops/pseuds/katsbishops
Summary: Question: does she tell her?Answer:yes.Five times that Kate Bishop tells her story, loosely following the Kübler-Ross model.





	The Five Stages of Grief

**Author's Note:**

> Obviously, this is going to deal with Kate's trauma and the aftermath of it. Nothing too explicit is said, but there are going to be some moments that get pretty emotional. I myself am a rape survivor, so this story is pretty personal for me. It's taken a long time to write, and I hope you all like it!

This chapter is the shortest I have written up so far, but I've been working on this story for ten months and might as well post the first part now. Dialogue is directly taken from the Young Avengers v1 special, so nothing in quotes belongs to me, it all belongs to the lovely people who wrote that run. 

 

* * *

 

Seven months, nine days, twenty hours, and forty-five minutes since the last time she walked through Central Park. She hadn't stopped counting since then.

 

Her sister had barely noticed a shift in her appearance and mannerisms, which was to be expected, but somehow people she'd met five months later knew something was wrong.

 

Jessica stands next to her, leaning against the half-wall that keeps them from falling, sipping coffee and watching the tourists skate around the rink as Kate tells her about Eleanor, about how not even Derek Bishop, _billionaire,_ could cure cancer.

 

"Meanwhile, you've taken up the bow and arrow."

 

_Question: does she tell her?_

_Answer:_ ** _yes._**

 

"Yeah, but that's not why." A breath, she inhales, lips rolling between teeth. "Well, not entirely."

 

Seven months, nine days, twenty hours, and forty-seven minutes.

 

Jessica nods, smiling that sad smile she's perfected, the one that makes Kate feel safe enough to say just why it is she knew how to throw that ninja star; exactly how she came to be this nameless hero.

 

And so she tells her, leaving out the part where she walked home crying, or the next day when she stayed in bed. She subtly skips past the sections she's yet to even tell her therapist, how she can barely accept this as real. It must have been a dream or a story she heard. Nothing like this could ever happen to someone like Kate; it happens on television and to _other people_. 

 

Tears well up in her eyes as she finishes, and Jessica pats her hand. There's something complicated in the look the reporter has, and that sad smile makes another appearance.

 

"Should I not have told you?" Regrets come flooding in: nobody cares about a sob-story; it was her own fault for being out so late at night; only people she pays to listen to her actually want her to tell them anything.

 

"No, it's just, a similar thing happened to me," Jessica says softly, avoiding eye contact, looking at the paper cup in her gloved hands.

 

"Is that why you became a superhero?" Somehow, she already knows the answer, caught in those brown eyes and the way Jessica's hair blows in the wind.

 

"It's why I quit."

 

Kate doesn't prod. She's been on the other end of such conversations enough times; people asking about her mom's death: _how do you feel; are you okay; do you miss her?_

 

**_(Angry; no; of-fucking-course-I-do)_**

 

Below, a young girl falls on the ice, blood where her tooth hit her lip visible even from where Kate stands. It reminds her of her own childhood; summering in the Hamptons and ballet lessons from a woman who danced for Balanchine: peeling sunburns and bloodied toes.

 

The child is lifted into the arms of her mother (or nanny, more likely) and Kate's hand, clad in a purple glove, wipes a single tear from her eye.


End file.
